History of Queens County, New York : with illustrations, portraits, and sketches of prominent families and individuals., Part 48

Author:
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: New York : W.W. Munsell and Co.
Number of Pages: 703

USA > New York > Queens County > History of Queens County, New York : with illustrations, portraits, and sketches of prominent families and individuals. > Part 48

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Supreme Court held at Jamaica, December 23d 1728, Lewis Morris, Esq., chief justice. Stephen Theo- balds on the demise of Carpenter and others vs. Thomas Poyer, rector of the parish of Jamaica.

Evidence for defendant : Copy of town vote read. Copy of warrant for town meeting read. Benjamin Wig- gins sworn. Defendant being called on confesses lease entry and ouster. A vote in 1698 empowering persons to carry on the building of a meeting-house or church. An act of Assembly for the erecting public edifices in 1699 read. Jonathan Whitehead sworn. A receipt from the trustees to Jonathan Whitehead as collector, for money gathered by him in 1702. Samuel Smith sworn. An act for settling a ministry in several towns in the province read. A copy of a record of a trial between Thomas Poyer and George McNish in the supreme court was produced as evidence, and allowed. A patent from Governor Nicoll to the inhabitants of Jamaica read. A release from William Hallett, the surviving patentee, to Thomas Poyer, for the church or building in dispute, read. Charles Doughty took his affirmation.

Evidence for plaintiffs : Nehemiah Smith sworn. Colonel Dongan's patent to the inhabitants of Jamaica

read. Zachariah Mills sworn. Town vote of Jamaica in 1726, to vest the ground on which the church stands in certain persons, read. John Foster and Samuel Smith sworn. William Carpenter and Thomas Smith sworn. Thomas Gales took his affirmation. Derick Brincker- hoff. John Petit and Andrew Clark sworn. A motion of Mr. Bickley, in an inferior court held at Jamaica, read. Daniel Whitehead sworn. Three orders of the town in 1689 read. Two orders of the town in 1697 read. Nicholas Berrian sworn. The jury find for plaintiff 6 pence damages and 6 pence costs.

Mr. Poyer's counsel complained of the partiality of the judge, for he designed to put the matter on some points of law which were in his favor, and in the time of trial offered to demur in law, but was diverted therefrom by the judge, who told him that he would recommend it to the jury to find a special verdict, and if they did not he would allow a new trial. This he afterward refused to do, saying a bad promise was better broken than kept.

Though the Presbyterians had now their church and parsonage in quiet possession they were taxed toward raising £60 per annum for the maintenance of the Church of England minister. This tax was levied on the three towns of Jamaica, Newtown and Flushing from 1704 till the Revolutionary war. This explains the fol- lowing vote: "At town meeting, Jamaica, April 5th 1737, voted by the majority of freeholders that Nathan Smith and Hendrick Eldert are chosen assessors; they are obliged to take a new assessment and deliver a copy of it to the vestrymen in order to their making the parish rate."

Walter Wilmot was ordained and installed here April 12th 1738 as pastor. He was 29 years of age. He mar- ried Freelove, daughter of Jotham Townsend, a woman eminent for her piety. The town voted April 21st that Mr. Wilmot should have possession of the parsonage etc. as long as he remained its minister. He died August 6th 1744. He was greatly beloved and many children were named after him, some "Walter " and some " Wilmot."

David Bostwick was ordained and installed here Octo- ber 9th 1745. He was 24 years of age.

At a meeting April 21st 1753 the town gave in trust the meadow and upland which in 1676 had been "set apart for the use of a minister of the Presbyterian denom- ination " to the elders and deacons, to be sold and the proceeds to be put at interest for the support of a Pres- byterian minister forever. Samuel Clowes jr., Robert Denton and Joseph Oldfield dissented. John Johnson bought this land May 21st for £163.

In r756 Mr. Bostwick was called to a Presbyterian church in New York. Elihu Spencer labored here as pastor or stated supply from May 22nd 1758 to May 1760, when he was appointed chaplain to a regiment going to the French and Indian war. Benoni Bradner preached here from 1760 to 1761. He was 26 years old, and mar- ried Miss Rebecca Bridges, of this place. He left on ac- count of a division in the congregation, and William Mills, of Smithtown, aged 22, began to preach here in July 1761 as a candidate. There were, he says, but twelve com- municants and no church records. There was a revival

233

THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF JAMAICA.

and many were added to the church. He died March 18th 1774, having been sick about a year.

Matthias Burnet was ordained and installed pastor here April 1775, at the age of 26. He married Ann Combs,of Ja- maica, an Episcopalian, and was perhaps the only Presby- terian minister who did not side with the patriots. During the armed occupation of Jamaica by the British Mr. Bur- net was permitted to preach undisturbed, and by his influ- ence with the loyalists preserved the church edifice from desecration. Soon after the British were established in Jamaica a parcel of loyalists perched themselves in the belfry of the church and commenced sawing off the steeple. Word was brought to Mr. Burnet; he had Whitehead Hicks, mayor of New York, as a guest at his Though Mr. Burnet saved the church from desecration, yet after the peace, when the exiled Whigs returned home, party spirit ran so high that he was forced to leave. He kept a school for a short time, but left for Norwalk in May 1785. He annually visited Jamaica, and in 1790 preached to an overflowing assembly in his old church.

· house, who soon put a stop to the outrage.

James Glassbrook preached here some time in 1786-7, but did not become a pastor. George Faitoute came here in July 1789, aged 39 years. The church then con- sisted of 96 heads of families and 58 communicants. He died on Sunday afternoon August 21st 1815, having preached in the morning.

W.HOWLAND

The above cut is a representation of the stone meet-

ing house erected by the town of Jamaica as a common place of worship for its inhabitants in 1699. It stood in the middle of the main street at the head of Union Hall street, then and long after called " Meeting-house lane." The building was taken down in 1813, when the present Presbyterian church was erected.

After the war and while there was no county court- house, the judges held their courts in the old church. Two robbers were here sentenced to death, and hanged at Beaver Pond in 1784. The edifice was of stone, 40 feet square, and had three doors, and aisles to correspond. The pulpit, surmounted by its sounding-board, stood on the north side, facing the gallery. For a time Mr. Ber- nardus Hendrickson, aged and hard of hearing, sat in the pulpit beside the minister. The minister had gown and bands. There was no stove. The women, arrayed (some at least) in scarlet cloaks, sat on chairs along the wide aisle, and had foot-stoves. The floor was sanded. There was little work for the sexton, Joseph Tuttle, to keep the house in order, so he was content (1791) to take up with a yearly salary of ft for taking care of the church, and fi for ringing the bell. The minister's sal- ary was $300, and parsonage, with some incidental ad- vantages, as marriage fees, spinning parties and special gifts when he had had sickness in his family, or other mis- fortunes. There were two services on the Lord's day, with an hour's intermission, when the people ate what they had brought from home, or went into Capt. Joseph Roe's bakery (where widow Waters now lives), and regaled themselves on gingerbread and spruce beer. Those that wished something stronger could get it at William Betts's inn (since Hewlett Creed's inn), over the way. Thomas Bailey, Joseph Tuttle and Charles S. Lord successively led the singing. Mr. Lord stood in the gallery, the others in front of the pulpit.

In course of time the edifice, though often cleaned, re- paired, shingled and painted, was not thought sufficiently convenient. The old glebe was sold and used as a female academy. Richard Creed's house and land was bought (the present parsonage). and May 24th 1813 the workmen began to take down the old stone church against whose walls the academy boys had played ball for years.

After the rubbish had been removed the ground under the church (especially beneath the communion table, in front of the pulpit) was carefully dug over, and the re- mains of those who had been buried there gathered up, placed in a box, conveyed in procession headed by the sexton, Jeffery Smith, to the village burying place, and again committed to the earth. So says the late Charles B. Shaw, who was present. Among these relics must have been the remains of Rev. Patrick Gordon, Rev. William Urquhart, and two wives of Rev. Thomas Poyer.

The new church was dedicated January 18th 1814, the corner stone having been laid June 9th 1813 by John Rider. The preacher was Rev. Dr. Milledoler, of New York. Rufus King was captivated with the discourse and asked Rev. Mr. Sayres, as they were coming out of church, the name of the eloquent divine. "Strange," says he, " that I never heard of him before."

234

HISTORY OF QUEENS COUNTY.

The cost of the church was $9.510.74. The accompany- ing engraving does not show the building in its original beauty. It had a graceful tapering spire, which rose 102 feet from the ground, and could be seen from far. In the course of time some persons thought it had been strained by the September gale of 1821, and that it was racking the frame work of the building, and in spite of the protests of a few objectors 27 feet of this symmetri- cal spire was sawn off and ignominiously pulled down by ropes. It fell with a crash and was broken into a thou- sand pieces, which were gathered in piles and sold for fuel to the highest bidder. Thus was this well propor- tioned edifice, peerless among the churches on Long Island, shorn of its principal ornament,

The people had become slack and careless under the failing strength of the good Mr. Faitoute, and few could pray in public. Rev. Henry R. Weed, fresh from Princeton Seminary, was called in 1815. He quickly infused a new energy into the religious life of his people. He started week day lectures and prayer-meeting, formed a Bible class and (though for a long time before there had been yearly contributions to the Education Society) prompted the ladies to organize societies for religious purposes. The ladies made a beautiful heavy cloth cloak, which they presented to him in form. After re-

covering from his surprise he thanked them for their care of his bodily comfort; and then, with an arch smile, he added (as if the cloak were a douceur), " Ladies, how can I hereafter, in preaching, call you sinners?" Mr. Weed was of acknowledged ability, a preacher of the old school,

of sterner stuff than ministers now are, There was no mistaking his notions of a future state, especially of the wicked. Smith Hicks, who from a carpenter had become an irreverent publican, used to say he "never knew a preacher who could take up a sinner in both hands, hold him out at arms' length, and so shake him over hell fire as Mr. Weed could."

Hitherto there had been no stove in the church. One Lord's day Mr. Weed broached the subject, and said he could stand the cold and keep warm by preaching, but he feared his people would be too uncomfortable to sit and listen patiently to his discourses. So the stoves, amid opposition, were set up. Mr. Weed found the hour's intermission too short to rest himself in, and the services were held later in the afternoon. The church had then no lamps for night service, nor sheds for the horses. He let the people know he sought not "theirs but them," and when some one hinted he should be con- tent with less salary he quietly left.

Mr. Weed discouraged the practice, then prevalent in the best families, of giving wine at funerals. In this he was seconded by Rev. Mr. Sayres. Time out of mind in humbler families rum was handed from one to another as they stood out of doors about the house, each man drinking directly out of the mouth of the upturned flask; wine was passed around to the women within the house. Captain Codwise, who lived at Beaver Pond, had a cask of the choicest wine stored away in his cellar for years, reserved for his funeral. The last and most dis- tinguished occasion in Jamaica of thus regaling the at- tendants was the funeral of Rufus King, our minister to England, who died April 29th 1827, at the age of 73. It was a warm day, and the waiters were kept going about, in doors and out, with silver salvers before them loaded with decanters, glasses and segars.

Mr. Weed and Mr. Sayres were (1818) chosen inspect- ors of common schools for Jamaica. They did their duty so strictly and exposed so many shortcomings in the teachers that they were not re-elected.

In 1821 an auxiliary missionary society was formed with 150 members. May 27th 1822 was formed a society for ameliorating the condition of the Jews. December 5th 1822, more than a dozen years before similar action in any other church, a Sabbath-school for colored people was started in the Presbyterian church. In 1823 a lec- ture room was built.

April 5th 1825 Othniel Smith died, leaving $2,000 to this church, $2,500 to the Princeton Theological Semi- nary, and $500 each to the Bible Society, Tract Society and Domestic Missionary Society. January 3Ist 1839 Miss Mary Hanna presented a beautiful set of chande- liers to the church.

Mr. Weed was succeeded in 1823 by Seymour P. Funck, who was ordained here March 6th. Some dis- satisfaction arising, his pastoral relation was dissolved May 9th 1825. Personal dissensions were rife and were not allayed till the advent of Asahel Nettleton, in the winter of 1826. He ignored his parishioners' quarrels, and instead of listening to their recriminations preached

235

JAMAICA PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH-QUAKER SERVICES.

to them all as sinners, and brought on a wonderful re- vival. On the 2nd of July 72 were added to the church and 18 baptized. He declined the pastoral charge, and was followed by Elias W. Crane, aged 30, who was in- stalled here October 31st 1826. He died suddenly No- vember roth 1840, a few hours after preaching an even- ing lecture. He was much esteemed.

Mr. James M. Macdonald was installed here May 5th 1841, and left April 16th 1850. His successor was Peter D. Oakey, who was installed here May 25th 1850 and re- signed September 4th 1870, from ill health. The con- gregation resolved to present him with $2,000, and con- tinue his salary till November Ist.

In the spring of 1846 the church was enlarged by the householders signed the pledge: Benjamin and Robert

addition of 131/2 feet to the length, making it 90 feet by 46, with 144 pews.

Lewis Lampman, the present pastor, was ordained here November 10th 1870. In 1879 the interior of the church was renovated, the organ was placed back of and over the pulpit and 104 comfortable pews were made on the lower floor.

Ministers have taken charge of this church as follows:

Zechariah Walker, February 14 1663; John Prudden, March 6 1670 and June 19 1676; William Woodruff, June 24 1675; George Phillips, 1693; Jeremiah Hobart, September 13 1698; John Hubbard1, 2, February -

1702; Francis Goodhue2, 1705; George McNish2, 1711; Robert Cross, September 18 1723; Walter Wilmot1, 2, April 12 1738; David Bostwick1, October 9 1745; Elihu Spencer, D. D., May 22 1758; Benoni Bradner, 1760; William Mills2, July 1761; Matthias Burnet, D. D., April 1775; James Glassbrook3, March 11 1786; George Fai- toute2, July 1789; Henry R. Weed, D. D.1, January 4 1816; Seymour P. Funck1, March 6 1823; Asahel Nettle- ton3, February to November 1826; Elias W. Crane2, Oc- tober 31 1826; James M. Macdonald, May 5 1841; Peter D. Oakey, May 25 1850; Lewis Lampmanı, November IO 1870.

THE "FRIENDS" AT JAMAICA.

In August 1657 Robert Hodgson, a traveling Quaker preacher, came to Jamaica, where he was received with gladness and made his home at Henry Townsend's, who invited his neighbors to come in and listen to a word of exhortation. As the governor, Peter Stuyvesant, had forbidden the harboring of Quakers he fined Townsend in the sum of £8 Flemish, or else to depart the province under the penalty of coporal punishment.

A few months after (December 29th) another Quaker preacher found his way to Jamaica; and Townsend of- fered nim the use of his house to preach in, for which act he was (January 8th 1658) fined 300 guilders, or about $120.

At length another traveling preacher, Daniel Wilson, guided by Samuel Spicer and Goody Tilton, made his way into Jamaica, and he found the door of Townsend standing wide open for his welcome reception. The names of those present (Samuel Andrews, Richard Brit- nell, Richard Chasmore, Samuel Deane and wife, Richard

Harker, Henry Townsend, John Townsend and wife) were reported to the governor January 9th 1661, and Townsend for the third time was brought before the now exasperated governor, who sentenced him to pay 600 guilders (about $240) and with his brother John to be banished from the province. Refusing to pay his fine Townsend suffered a long imprisonment.

The governor next sent a dozen soldiers to inforce obedience to his ordinance against Quaker preaching, and to be quartered on the inhabitants of Jamaica till they should pledge themselves to aid the authorities in putting down Quaker meetings. To escape the annoy- ance of having soldiers in their houses the following Coe, Richard Chasmore, Nathaniel Denton, Richard Everitt, Thomas and William Foster, Rodger Lynas, Samuel Mathews, Andrew Messenger, George Mills, John Rods, Samuel, Abraham and Morris Smith, Henry Steves, Thomas Wiggins and Luke Watson. The soldiers were then quartered on those who refused to sign the pledge, viz., John Townsend, Samuel Deane, Nathaniel Coles, Richard Britnell, Benjamin Hubbard and Richard Harker. Soon after this Coles, Harker and the two Townsends removed to Oyster Bay to be beyond the governor's jurisdiction.

We hear no more of Quaker agitations till George Fox visited Long Island, when Christopher Holder and other Friends came to Jamaica (6th month 1672) and held a meeting. Holder was succeeded by others from time to time.

The persistent preaching of Friends against "hireling priests " had its effect; for in 1674, May 9th, William Creed and Humphrey Underhill refused to contribute to the maintenance of a minister who was paid by the town in general. In 1678 Samuel Deane complained that "he was distrained of 18 shillings by the magistrates of Jamaica for priests' wages of Zachary Walker and John Prudden, and a little more for his not training. Hugh Cowperthwaite also had ro shillings taken from him by constraint for the wages of the priest of Jamaica."

Friends' principles had now taken such growth in Jamaica that on the 27th of December 1686 it was agreed that a quarterly meeting should be held there on the last First day of July 1687.

In 1699 Roger Gill with others came to Jamaica and " held a pretty large inceting in an orchard. The Lord's power was there." In July 1700 William Penn and other Friends visited Jamaica, held a meeting and disbursed LI to for their entertainment at an inn. Thomas Story, a preacher, says in 1702: "We had a large, good meet- ing in Jamaica. Several lawyers who were attending the court there and other company came to listen to us, all very sober and attentive." The next year Story had another large meeting there and visited Samuel Bownas, imprisoned in the county jail for preaching against the ceremonies of the Church of England.

In 1706 the Friends bought for £5 a lot of ground 80 by 50 feet on which to build a meeting-house.

In 1725 Thomas Chalkley had a large meeting in Ja-

I. Ordained when settled here.

2. Died pastors of this church.

3. Not installed as pastors.

236

HISTORY OF QUEENS COUNTY.

maica, at which "several in authority were present, who were very loving and respectful." In 1727 Samuel Bow. nas had a large meeting. With others came gener- ally his old neighbors, among whom he had been a prisoner twenty years before, and were glad to see him.

In 1729 and again in 1738 the meeting-house required repairs; and from time to time it was rented out with the land, the Friends reserving the privilege of holding meet- ings there.

At last the society began to dwindle and the rents were not promptly paid, so that the yearly meeting offered the property for sale. "The Quaker lot " was bought in 1797 by William Puntine for £200. From this date Quaker preachers have from time to time held meetings in some public room, taking care to send word around the village.

THE REFORMED (DUTCH) CHURCH OF JAMAICA.

The organization of this church at Jamaica is veiled in obscurity. It seems to have occurred before 1702, for the first record of baptism is dated June ist of that year. But long before this time the Dutch had gradually been emigrating from Kings county into the western part of Queens, for we find twenty-one Dutch names among the contributors of a free gift (January 21st 1694) to Rev. Mr. Phillips, the Presbyterian minister at Jamaica. As there was a church built at the common expense of the town in 1699 it is probably that the Dutch ministers from New York and Kings county whenever they visited Ja- maica officiated in it for the Dutch congregation, as one of them (Antonides) certainly did on Sunday September 20th 1709. In 1714 the congregation paid £40 New York money for their share of the services of the minis- ters of Kings county.

April 29th 1715 the elders and deacons of the Dutch congregation throughout all Queens county resolved unanimously to build a church at Jamaica. The sum of £361.18.6 was raised by subscription. The surnames of the subscribers were Adriance, Ammerman, Antony, At- ten, Baird, Barentse, Bas, Beekman, Bergen, Berrien, Blaw, Blom, Boerum, Boog, Bras, Brinkerhoff, Burtis, Carpenter, Cockefer, Cornell, Covert, Crankheid, Demott, Ditmarse, Doesenburg, Dorlandt, Dreck, Dowe, Elderse, Edsall, Foreest, Forheisen, Fyn, Gennon, Gerritse, Glean, Goetbloet, Golder, Haff, Hardenburg, Hagewout, Havi- land, Hendrickson, Hegeman, Hoogelandt, Jansen, Kip, Kolyer, Loosie, Lott, Lammerse, Lucasen, Luyster, Mas- ten, Monfort, Montanye, Norstrandt, Onderdonk, Polhe- mus, Probasco, Rapelye, Remsen, Reicke, Robertsen, Ryder, Schenck, Smith, Snedeker. Springsteen, Stevense, Teller, Van Cleef, Vanderbilt, Van Hoek, Van Leuwen, Van Lettingen, Van Nostrand, Van Wicklen, Van Wyck, Wiltse and Willemsen.

The surnames of purchasers of seats from 1716 to 1753 were Bennet, Clowes, Coerten, Cornelisse, Durye, Ecker, Freest, Grix, Humphreys, Lanen, Laton or Letten, Lefferts, Lent, Lupardus, Molenarr, Read, Ryerse, Simonson, Sherlock, Stillwell, Stockholm, Van Ars- | in sincerity."

dalen, Van Duyne, Van Solingen, Van Soolen and Wyckoff.

May 13th 1715 a lot of 25 square roods next to Henry Filkins's was bought for the site of the new church, from Rev. Benjamin and Abigail Woolsey (of Dosoris,, for the nominal price of five shillings. The church having been erected the congregation met in it for the first time on June 15th 1716, and chose persons to allot the men's and women's seats. The building was an octagon, with a steep roof, in the center of which was a cupola with a bell cast at Amsterdam, at a cost of £8. In 1720 the church was painted at a cost of £15.10.

June 7th 1727 the consistory of the church wished to withdraw from their combination with the Kings county churches and have a pastor to themselves, because they were surrounded by Quakers and Anabaptists, and their children were apt to intermarry with strangers and go off to other religious bodies. The project failed for the time, but in three or four years afterward churches were started at Newtown, Success and Wolver Hollow, all in connection with the mother church at Jamaica. A call was made out August 20th 1730 for a minister from Hol- land, at a salary of £80 New York currency: but no minister would leave Holland for so small a sum. It was increased to fioo, but still no minister could be found there who would accept it.

The floor of the church was sanded. In 1737 15 pence was paid for sweeping the church and 4 pence for half a bushel of sand.

In 1741, after waiting nine years and having made sev- eral unsuccessful efforts to procure a minister from Hol- land, a call was made on Rev. Johannes Henricus Goet- schius, of Pennsylvania, who was installed April 19th in the church at Jamaica, by Dominie Freeinan, who preach- ed from these words: " Lo I am with you alway, even to the end of the world." In September a parsonage was bought (where Aaron A. Degrauw now lives) of Thomas Smith, at a cost of £185. Mr. Goetschius was an able preacher and a learned man, but of a warm temperament. He preached a sermon August 22nd 1742 on the unknown God, wherein he rebuked the lukewarmness of his con- gregations. This aroused a spirit of resentment, which caused a division among the people and ended in his removal in 1748.

November 21st 1752 Thomas Romeyn preached a trial sermon, which proving satisfactory he received a call on condition of his going to Holland for ordination. April 10th 1753 he gave his departing sermon and then took ship for Holland; on April 9th 1754 he had re- turned, and he was inducted November 10th by Dominie Ver Bryck according to the order of classis. In March 1755 he made a pastoral visitation from house to house throughout the whole congregation of Jamaica, and met with rough handling from the friends of Goetschius. On April 6th he celebrated the Lord's Supper and admitted 16 members. The divisions continuing in the congrega- tion caused Mr. Romeyn to leave. He preached his last sermon November 30th 1760, from Ephesians vi. 24, " Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ

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History of Queens County, New York : with illustrations, portraits, and sketches of prominent families and individuals., Part 48

Author: Publication date: 1882 Publisher: New York : W.W. Munsell and Co. Number of Pages: 703

Author:
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: New York : W.W. Munsell and Co.
Number of Pages: 703